Saturday, June 14, 2008

Napoleon of the Stump...

This has nothing to do with Japan, but it's an election year back home and this song tells the story of a man who accomplished everything he set out to do, then removed himself from public life and promptly died.

While the man himself was from perfect and perhaps can be harshly judged from a modern perspective- an aggressive expansionist, he confronted Great Britain and negotiated the purchase of the Oregan Territories, waged war with Mexico (inspiring Henry David Thoreau's night in jail and brilliantly conceived literary work Civil Disobedience) and also was a lifelong slaveholder who supported extending the Missouri Compromise into the newly-acquired western territories- there's no denying James K. Polk's presidency was incredibly successful.